Eighteen Ways
by Crunkn8r82
Summary: Post 'Agent Afloat'. Tony gets an answer he isn't ready for. One Shot.


_**A/N: **I wrote this quite some time ago and never got the nerve up to post it until I started cleaning out 'extraneous documents' from my computer and I had a bit of separation anxiety with it. But I'm good now. (I hope.) I highly enjoyed "Agent Afloat" and I am always happy when Tony isn't being an idiot but is actually shown to be more than capable of being a 'Very Special Agent'. Anyways, I thought I would share. Please be kind? And if you can't, please give me CONSTRUCTIVE CRITICISM! =) _

* * *

It was well after midnight by the time the bullpen had cleared out. McGee, Abby, and Ducky had called it a night more than an hour before. Gibbs grabbed his jacket and keys before throwing a glance over at his senior field agent. It was good to have him back. Things had felt... off ... in his absence. "DiNozzo, David, go home." He threw over his shoulder as he walked toward the elevator.

"Hey, Boss," Tony called out to him as he jogged to catch up, "thanks."

Gibbs smiled. "You may want to check and see if Ducky has your stapler."

Tony's face fell as the doors to elevator opened and he stepped inside. "But Boss-" the elevator door cut off his plea. He ran back to his desk checking the drawers and finding said stapler in the bottom drawer. "Oh, Mighty Mouse, I've missed you."

"Do you always make it a habit to talk to your office supplies?" Ziva asked.

"This from the woman who uses them as weapons," he shot at her. A glint appeared in her eyes.

"Tony," she began. Ziva stood slowly made her way over to his desk. He looked up at her, "do you remember the time I told you about my-"

"Tattoo on your inner -"

"No!" she practically shouted. Casting a glance at the nearly empty squad room another look came over her. "Eighteen ways, DiNozzo. Eighteen ways."

Tony gulped. She turned around and went back to her desk. He observed her carefully as she retrieved her bag and shut down her computer. If she did not kill him with a paperclip, watching her swaying hips would surely be his ultimate demise. Almost four and a half months of being an Agent Afloat with five thousand sailors, he was on the cusp of insanity. He lived for shore leave and whenever he could, he made it over to the Banana Moon for a night of drinking, if only to drown her out of his head. It worked for a little while... until he met Lorena. The singer could have been Ziva's twin. Though the two women looked alike, they couldn't be more different. He was sure there was some higher power getting pleasure out of watching him get tortured.

"Tony?" Ziva called out to him. He looked at her just then. "Do you want a ride home?"

"Yeah, that'd be great. But I'm starving, dinner?" he asked.

"Only if you don't mind me changing out these clothes first," she said as she reached for her keys.

He'd forgotten what a psychotic driver his partner was. It had taken him a moment to orient himself when he'd stepped onto the sidewalk in front of her building. "What are you, practicing for the Indy 500?" he asked with his hand over his stomach. He was glad he hadn't eaten anything because he was pretty sure that he would have redecorated the interior of her car with it on the ride over here.

She scowled at him.

"So this is Casa David," he said as he walked through her front door.

Gesturing to the kitchen she told him, "Help yourself to whatever you want, I'll be back in a minute." And disappeared down the hall.

"Are you sure you don't need any help in there?" he called out to her. She slammed her bedroom door and he grinned. It was good to be home or as close to his own as he could get at the moment. He took a moment wandering around her living room, looking at the few personal effects she had scattered around. He came upon a photo of two little girls, one of them obviously Ziva. He'd know those eyes anywhere. Picking up the frame, he studied it for a moment, recalling what she'd said to him once about having to grow up quickly.

"Ready?" she asked.

He turned his attention to her and almost fell over.

"What?" she asked.

His eyes travelled from her top down to her denim clad legs. Could those pants get any tighter? He doubted it, just like he doubted any other woman could make a pair of jeans an aphrodisiac. "Uh," he put the photo down, "Nothing."

She put on her jacket and grabbed her purse.

He placed his hand on the small of her back as she left the apartment and said, "I was just wondering where you had your gun."

"You'll never find out," she threw at him.

Fifteen minutes later found them at a nearby diner with coffee in front of them. "I thought for sure Vance would send me back to that damned carrier," he said quietly as he stared out the window.

"Why?"

His eyebrows shot up. "Why? Come on, Ziva."

"Because of Jenny?"

Twisting the saucer under his cup, he told her, "I screwed up."

"I thought you weren't beating yourself up over it anymore."

"I'm not. I've accepted it." He signaled the waitress to refill his cup.

"Jenny dying wasn't your fault, Tony. She made her own choices."

His retort was cut short at the arrival of their order. His brows furrowed at her meal. "A salad?"

"And I should have ordered breakfast at one in the morning like you?"

He shrugged. "What? I like pancakes."

They ate in relative silence, Tony stealing her cherry tomatoes and Ziva scowling. "You don't want them anyway." She smiled. It was good to have him back she begrudgingly admitted to herself.

She drove him home and couldn't find it in her heart to decline when he asked her to stay for a drink. "Come on, Zee-vah. It's not a homecoming without some tequila or whiskey or both." And then he'd flashed her that charming smile of his. The same smile that got him whatever he wanted.

"One, Tony," she sighed. "We're on duty at oh-eight hundred."

He laughed and rubbed his hands together. "Pick your poison."

One drink had morphed into four and before she knew it, her legs felt as heavy as lead and she could barely keep her eyes open. "Come on Ziva, off to bed you go."

"I'm not sleeping with you," she slurred.

"You wound me, but that's not what I meant." He told her as he pulled her to stand and placed his hands on her hips to guide her to his room.

How was it that he managed to remain sober?

"You'll sleep in my bed and I'll take the couch."

"Your first night home and you sleep on the sofa? This is wrong."

"Tell me about it. Hot chick in my bed and I'm going to be a gentleman," he said pulling the sheets and blanket back.

"You were right," she told him as he stooped down to take off her shoes.

"About where your gun is?" he smiled.

"Something happened in Israel... I was undercover." She was quiet for a moment and then continued. "I almost died." He stopped short of her right shoe and looked up at her.

She shrugged her shoulders.

"Ziva," he started. He wasn't sure he wanted to hear this after all. He thought naturally whatever had happened with Mossad had to do with a man not with a mission that could have gotten her killed.

She pointed a finger at him. "You wanted to know."

"Well, yeah but..." he re-focused his efforts on her shoe and then pushed her back pulling the covers over her. "Not now."

She propped herself on her elbows and looked at him. "I almost died, Tony. This is what you call a 'war story', yes?"

"More like a nightmare," he muttered as he sat on the bed next to her.

They faced their mortality everyday on the job but there was a certain comfort he'd found knowing that Gibbs, Ziva, and McGee had his back.

"There was a bomb," she said with clarity. "The doctors said it was a miracle I wasn't hurt more than I was."

Against his better judgment, the question burst forth. "What happened?"

"I was following a lead and the bomb went off. I was in a coma for three days." She fell back into the pillows with her eyes closed. "That is what happened in Israel. Now you know."

He watched her for a long time as she slept, not speaking, wondering if he could have handled another death. First Kate, then Paula, and finally Jenny. If Ziva had been added to the list, would he have been able to survive it? He brushed a curl away from her face, remembering how soft her hair was. He stood quickly, sure that if he didn't, he'd probably do something stupid, something that he wouldn't be able to walk away from.

He found their abandoned bottle of whiskey and poured himself a heavy shot. There were eighteen ways she could kill him with a paperclip, but he was pretty sure she'd managed to do just that with a few simple words.


End file.
